Every week, I go to French meetups where Seattle’s francophiles meet to practice French. I speak the language and love travel, but that’s where our interests diverge. I use Quebec slang. I still really don’t know what to do with paté. (Spread it like jelly? Bite off a hunk?) And I am *really* good at getting crumbs in my scarf.

Last week, the group’s leader brought up Romy Schneider, an Austrian actress I had never heard of.

I heard “Rob Schneider.” Instantly, I perked up from my croissant coma.

“This is turning around,” I thought. “Sure, it’s a really dated reference, but I can discuss Rob Schneider. I can even discuss him in French. It isn’t a total waste of a Saturday.”

It was time to dust off the bad impersonation of Making Copies.

Oooh the French Group. Speakin’ French. Eatin’ Paté.

No, no, no. That’s all wrong. Should I mention how the Sensitive Naked Man is devastatingly underrated? Should I bring up my theory on Deuce Bigalow as an allegory about the modern male condition?

Or about my conspiracy theory about how the Hot Chick was a set up to ruin Rob Schneider’s career?

I did none of these things because the group started going on about how Romy Schneider died at the end of every movie. And I was like, wait, Rob Schneider didn’t die at the end of Waterboy. And then I realized quite suddenly just how close I came to the kind of humiliation you never recover from.

Sigh. One for French-speaking, cultured Seattleites. Zero for me.